Je viens de terminer la lecteur de The Esoterrorists
Division entre deux types d'habilités: investigation (réussi tout le temps) et générale (avec une chance d'échec).
"The two ability sets are handled in different way because they fulfill distinct narrative functions. The rules governing general abilities introduce the possibility and uncertainty. Uncertain outcomes make scenes of physical action more exciting, but can stop a mystery story dead if applied to the collection of information." (p.11)
Propos: GUMSHOE est un système pour gérer les scénarios d'enquête.
"Why This Game Exists? Investigative scenarios have been done wrong since the early days of roleplaying games. As a consequence, they're hard to run and prone to grind to a halt. GUMSHOE is here to fix all that."
"They treat clues the same way that dungeon games treat treasure. [... In those games], the central activity is killing the monsters. [...] The treasure finding phase come afterwards, as a mere reward. If you don't get all the treasure, you lose out a bit, but the story keep going, as you tromp down the hallway to the next monster-filled chamber."
"Imagine a dungeon game where you always had to roll well to find another room to plunder, or sit around feeling frustrated and bored."
In a fictional procedural, [...] the emphasis isn't on finding the clues in the first place. [...] The action really starts after the clues are gathered."
"Investigative scenarios are not about finding clues, they're about interpreting the clues you do find." [p.26]
Difficulty Numbers and Story Pacing
"[...] GM must ensure that tests and contests essential to forward narrative can be easily overcome. Assign relatively low Difficulty Numbers [...] to these crucial plot points. Reserve especially hard Difficulty Numbers for obstacles which provide interesting but nonessential benefits." [p.33]
- What Do Pool Points Represent? *
"Pool points are a literary abstration, representing the way each character gets his or her own time in the spotlight in the course of an ensemble drama. When you do something remarkable, you expend a little bit of your spotlight time. More active players will spend their points sooner than less demonstrative ones, unless they carefully pick and choose their moments to shine.
Remember, all characters are remarkably competent. Pool points measure your opportunities to exercise this ultra-competence during any given scenario.
Pool points do not represent a resource, tangible or otherwise, in the game world. Players are aware of them, but characters are not. The team members'ignorance of them is analogous to TV characters' obliviousness to commercial breaks, the unwritten rules of scene construction, and the tendency of events to heat up during sweeps.
We represent this most purely in the case of investigative skills, which are the core of the game. Their refreshments is tied to a purely fictional construct, the lenght of the episode.
However, where a pool could be seen to correspond to a resource perceptible to the characters, we handle refreshment in a somewhat more realistic, if also abstract manner. Characters' ebbing Health scores are perceptible to the characters in the form of welts, cuts, pain, and general fatigue. Stability is less tangible but can be subjectively measured in the characters' moods and reactions. Physical abilities, also tied to fatigue and sharpness of reflexes, are also handled with a nod to the demands of realism." [p.49]
- Designing Scenarios *
"The GUMSHOE system supports a certain style of scenario design. The rules are less important to the success of your game than the way you structure your adventures."
- Calling on Abilities *
"Make this choice [of the way to call on abilities] according to the consequences of failure."
"If the consequence of failure is that a character fails to get a piece of crucial information, success should be automatic provided that the character has the ability in question [credibility], and the player things to ask for it."
"If you have a piece of information [that] is not essential to move the through the story [choose] the cost of the spend according to [its] entertainment value [and] not the game-world difficulty of completing the task."
"If an action's consequence of failure might be madness, death or injury, by all mean make it a test."
"Horror characters are expected to die early and often. [...] For this reason, we advise you to structure Esoterrorist campaigns in an episodic manner, so that no ongoing plotline depends on the continued survival of any particular PC."